


all the way back where i come from

by polyamory



Series: 30 days of tw femslash [7]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: 30 Days of Femslash, Alive Vernon Boyd & Erica Reyes, Apologies, Erica Feels, Erica-centric, F/F, Future Fic, Happy Ending, POV Erica Reyes, Pre-Slash, Rebuilt Hale House, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-17
Updated: 2016-05-17
Packaged: 2018-06-09 00:41:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6882436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/polyamory/pseuds/polyamory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Erica, Boyd, you might not have graduated with us but you were part of the pack once. We're having our own little pack reunion before class reunion. You're cordially invited. Where? The Hale-McCall House. When? Saturday, 2.30 PM" It's signed by Scott Hale-McCall.</p>
            </blockquote>





	all the way back where i come from

**Author's Note:**

> this is more gen than anything else although erica and lydia do agree to go on a date in the future but my main otp is erica/happiness so have this for the erica rare pair week  
> (also i'm sorry in the delay in posting there will hopefully be two fics posted today and then we're back as scheduled)

There it is. "Class Reunion." Embossed in golden letters across the front of the card, like that's a reason to be excited.

"We didn't even graduate with them," Boyd says, looking over her shoulder. Erica flips the card open. There's the date and the time and the place and below, written by hand, "Erica, Boyd, you might not have graduated with us but you were part of the pack once. We're having our own little pack reunion before class reunion. You're cordially invited. Where? The Hale-McCall House. When? Saturday, 2.30 PM" It's signed by Scott Hale-McCall.

They look at each other for a long moment before Boyd shrugs. "Can't hurt to go."

Erica's a little less sure, anxiously aware of all the ways it could hurt. But curiosity almost killed her once and if it hadn't been that it would have been her stubbornness, so she'll go. To see how they all are and to show them, or maybe herself, that she's not afraid to go back.

"Can't hurt," she agrees.

When they ask Selene about it, she's happy to let them go. Which makes sense because they've been with her for fifteen years now and she trusts them, but maybe in some corner of her brain Erica hoped Selene would say no.

She doesn't though, so after they juggle their schedules so they can take the weekend off, Boyd books their flights and then it's two long weeks of waiting.

Granted, it's not like she thinks about it constantly, she doesn't have the time for that, between helping with homework and cooking and trying not to trip on toys, but when she's sitting awake at night, giving Santana her bottle, she can't help worrying at the thought, like shaking a box just to see what anxieties will fall out.

Sometimes Boyd wanders over, if one of the other kids has woken him. He puts a calming hand on her shoulder and just stands there, steady as ever, rocking Bee or maybe Lexy on his hip until they fall asleep.

Finally Friday rolls around. They say their goodbyes to all the kids and promise that of course they'll be back.

By this point Erica's already lived through any and all worst case scenarios her brain could come up with. She's moved on to acceptance and she's accepted that she may not win reunion, but she's at least going to be true and damn proud of her life. Because no matter how hectic and loud and chaotic it gets sometimes, she loves what Boyd and she have built together, the house, the kids, and all their helping hands.

She manages to nap on the plane, her head cushioned on Boyd's shoulder. He shakes her awake gently when they go into landing and she smiles at him.

"You nervous?"

He gives a half shrug, but Erica's learned long ago to read his face so she sees the slight pull of his eyebrows, the twist at the corner of his mouth.

"Yeah, me too."

 

"Okay, how do I look?" Erica asks, standing in front of the hotel mirror. She turns left and right to inspect herself.

"You look great," Boyd says, the same thing he's said about her last two outfits.

"You're not even looking," Erica says, glaring at him in the mirror.

Very pointedly, Boyd looks up from his book and meets her eyes.

"You look great," he says again.

"Thank you." She tugs at the her blouse, dark red combined with high waisted black jeans. Her hair is done up in a French braid, barely tamed.

"Alright," she says, turning around. "You ready to go?"

Boyd glances at his watch, then decides it's best not to argue with her. "Alright," he sighs.

"Great, c'mon."

They get to the Hale-McCall house, formerly just the Hale house, fifteen minutes early, but it seems like everybody's already there.

"Erica! Boyd!" Scott calls out when he sees them. "I wasn't sure you'd come." Erica realizes they never confirmed their invitation. "It's so great to see you again."

"You too," Boyd says.

"Come on round the back, we're still waiting on some people, but you're just in time. Derek's just thrown on the grill."

Erica can smell it, the taste of smoke in the air. It used to linger around here way back when, but that seems like nothing more than a dream now. The house is completely transformed, light years away from the burned out shell Erica remembers.

Scott must see her staring because he says, with a wry twist of his lips, "We renovated, can you tell?"

"Yeah," Erica laughs, "you really turned the place around."

And it's true, the house looks big and bright and homey, like a place full of laughter. They come around the corner then, and the noise Erica'd been vaguely aware of gets louder. The backyard is filled with people, sitting or standing in small groups. There's a big banquet table, already set, and a bonfire not yet burning, and there's Derek, manning the grill, a kid of maybe seven years at his side, watching him with wide eyes.

He looks good, healthier and happier, he looks like someone who belongs in a house full of laughter. The Derek she knew had always looked like he belonged in the burnt Hale house, as much of a skeleton of a home as he was a skeleton of a person, and Erica had never been able to reconcile the Derek she knew growing up in the house she'd seen in old pictures from before the fire. But this Derek looks like he belongs and her heart fills with happiness for him.

He looks up and catches her eye, beckons them over with a soft smile.

"I'll leave you to it," Scott says with a nod in Derek's direction and disappears into the house.

Erica steels herself, taking a long breath, and grabs Boyd's hand. Boyd squeezes tight, which means he's just as nervous as she is.

"Hey," Derek smiles when they make their way over and it's nothing Erica's ever seen before. "Good to see you."

Boyd lets go of her hand to wrap Derek in a hug and Derek looks momentarily surprised before hugging back.

"You've changed," Erica says when Derek turns his attention to her. "Good."

Derek smiles again and it feels almost surreal. Derek back in the day never smiled, sure he smirked or grinned or bared his teeth, but never this soft and happy thing.

"You have, too," Derek says, but before he can go on the little kid rugs on his hand.

"Dad," he says, pointing at the grill where, yup, that's definitely burnt.

"Oh, shoot! Thank you, Sam." Derek hurries to grab the steaks from the grill. "Uh, Erica, Boyd, this is Sam, our eldest son. Sam, these are Erica and Boyd. I told you about them, remember?"

The kid nods shyly and Erica smiles gently at him, crouching down to his height to shake his hand. "Hello, Sam. And how old are you?"

"I'm six," Sam says.

"Six?" Erica grins. "You are tall for a six year old."

Sam preens, smiling back at her. "Dad says one day I'm gonna be just as strong as him."

"I bet you are," Erica agrees.

Sam has Derek's nose, that's for sure, and his bunny teeth.

"Do you want to meet my sisters?" Sam asks.

Erica glances up at Derek and he's smiling fondly, giving her a little nod.

"I'd love to," she says to Sam.

"Hey," Derek says softly when she straightens up. "We'll talk later, okay?"

"Yeah," Erica smiles.

Sam takes her hand and leads her away. When she turns around Derek is handing Boyd a pair of barbecue tongs. She smiles to herself.

"Laura! Mel!" Sam calls towards a group of kids playing catch near the forest edge. Two girls run up to him with identical grins on their faces. "This is Erica," Sam pronounces as if this means anything, but the girls eyes go wide and wondrous, so maybe to them it does. Erica wonders what kind of stories exactly Derek told them.

"This is Laura and this is Melissa," Sam points to them.

"Mel," the girl on the right frowns, aiming a kick at her brother's shin.

"Don't worry, Miss Erica," Laura says, "no one can tell us apart except for Papa and Dad."

"You must get up to a lot of trouble," Erica grins, looking between the identical girls. Their skin is slightly darker than Sam's, more of Scott in their features.

"It's only trouble if you get caught," Laura grins.

"And we  _ never _ get caught," Mel adds.

Erica supposes that Scott and Derek would be exactly the kind of softies that let their kids get away with all kinds of shenanigans, supernatural hearing or not.

"Auntie Lydia," Laura calls suddenly, and runs past Erica to jump into the woman's arms and, yep, that is definitely Lydia "queen bee" Martin. And suddenly Erica remembers the admiration hate crush she had on her.

"Hello, Laura!" Lydia groans, lifting Laura up and then settling her on her hip, Laura's arms clinging to her neck like a monkey. "Erica," Lydia says to her, "I thought that was you." Her smile is kinder than Lydia remembers it ever being and she looks softer, too. But then again, Erica supposes, so does she herself probably.

"Yeah, that's me. Scott sent us an invite."

"I know, I made him," Lydia smiles. "Why don't you come, sit. We can catch up."

"Uh, sure," Erica agrees, a little wrong-footed. She knew that Lydia would be here, but she honestly didn't expect to spend much time with her, or time at all for that matter. It's not like they were especially close in high school.

But Lydia's smile is still nothing but friendly, no sarcasm, no venom, no secret agenda. She looks good, still and probably always will, hair in a large knot at her neck, a braid along the left side of her head. It all looks effortless and easy.

They sit down at a table a little way off and Laura runs back to play with her friends.

"So, how've you been?" Lydia asks, chin propped in one hand. "You're up in Montana now, aren't you? Took Scott quite a bit to track down an address."

"Yeah, we, um. After we left we made our way upwards, kind of bouncing from pack to pack, visiting, staying for a few days and moving on. But then we found Selene and her pack and it was just such a good fit. Selene, she must be going on fifty now, and she was the youngest one of her old pack, lost them all to old age so she inherited the alpha power, but instead of turning new people she started taking in omegas looking for a pack, betas from packs with bad structure, that kind of thing. We fit right in," she smiles a little at the memory, of how reluctant they'd been to tell their story. Fear of being seen as unloyal, flighty, not worthy of a place in the pack, but it had been such a non-issue to Selene. "Now we run a foster home for werewolf kids who end up in the system, but can't go to human families, you know? Especially the young ones, they haven't learned control yet. It gets messy sometimes but it's good."

"How do you get a hold of them?" Lydia asks and she sounds genuinely intrigued. "I mean, it's a genius idea, and it's definitely needed, but how do you know? Do you just wait for strange reports to come in?"

"Oh, no," Erica shakes her head. "There are two people in our pack who work in the foster system and since we started the house we've worked up a network of weres in the foster system all throughout Montana and even the surrounding states sometimes. They check the kids out and if they're weres they talk to them and send them our way. Sometimes we even get other supernatural beings. We had a fae child once, that was fun. Try changing a diaper when the little thing keeps floating up to the ceiling," Erica shakes her head fondly. "We try to get them moved into permanent families, of course, preferably packs, so we teach them the control they need-"

"Hopefully not the way Derek taught you."

"No," Erica laughs, and it really must be a good sign that she can laugh about those terrible memories now. "No, believe me."

"You know," Lydia says, voice going softer as she stares out across the yard to where Derek is standing. "Derek did a lot of growing in the years after you left. He got over a lot of his own shit. He repented for the shit he did, to all of us. I mean, we all did, you know. We all went away for college and with that distance- we hurt each other so much at times just because we were all so fraud and terrified. But we apologized, we made up."

Now she's looking at Erica, eyes sad and earnest. "Derek never got the chance to apologize to you for what he did, and I think it's been weighing on him more than he lets on." She stops for a moment, silence heavy, then shakes her head as if shaking away the thought. "But he should tell you this himself, I'm sure he will. Do you know he tells his kids stories about you and Boyd?" She brightens, like storm clouds moving past the sun. "They have a saying, it goes like, 'What does Erica do when she's afraid? She tries anyways'. Scott tells them that story from the rock climbing wall a lot, you remember that?" Of course she does.

"So, what about you?" Erica asks, because she's genuinely curious and because she's getting a little uncomfortable with all this talk about herself. "Did you ever win that Fields Medal?"

She means it as a joke, but Lydia grins, brilliant and beautiful, and nods, "You bet your ass I did, didn't even have my PhD yet and they were already knocking down my door. But actually I teach at the college. Spent some time as a TA and it just never let me go, I guess. I'm full-time at a college right near here, gotta stay close to home, but I give guest lectures from time to time all over."

"So nothing's really changed since high school, you're still the best at what you do, and still a woman in high demand."

"Oh, honey," Lydia laughs, but it doesn't sound as condescending as it might've had fifteen years ago. "So much has changed since high school. And damn am I glad about it." There's something in her eyes when she says it, looking at Erica with some kind of meaning that Erica doesn't catch, not quite. "But you  _ are _ right about the first part," she grins.

There's a loud shriek followed by laughter and they both turn to look at the children, rolling around in the grass without abandon. "Do  _ you _ have any kids?" Erica asks, nodding towards where the group is playing.

"No," Lydia says, shaking her head, just as Scott comes up behind them.

"Oh, don't sell yourself short, Lyds, you helped out great with Sam, Mel and Laura," he says. He puts a plate of shashlik down between them on the table

"'Helping out?'" Lydia says as she grabs one, popping a piece of meat in her mouth. "Is that what we're calling it now?"

"Lydia was our egg donor," Scott explains to Erica. She must be looking pretty confused. "We didn't really want to bring in a stranger and Lydia offered her assistance."

Erica looks at her and, okay, she's a little astounded but she should just get used to being proven wrong cause it's becoming a theme.

"I got first dips on godparent," Lydia says with a nonchalant shrug, but Scott's smile is fond and full of gratitude. It's strange to see Lydia and Scott joking around like they're old friends, which technically they are now, but in Erica's memory they've been frozen in high school when Lydia looked at them like something she'd scrape off the bottom of her shoe, even if some of that coldness was only for show.

"So you've got just the three of them?" Erica asks Scott.

_ "Just?" _ Lydia snorts. "The plan was for two."

"The twins were unexpected, but a blessing nonetheless," Scott smiles. "And, yeah, it's just the three of them. You met Laura and Mel already, right?"

"Yeah," Erica grins. "They're a lot like you way back in the sandbox days. So, sorry, I have to ask, but. Laura's obviously named after Derek's sister-" Scott nods. "-and Mel, she's named after Melissa, right? So is your mom…?"

"Oh no, she's not dead." Scott rushes. "No. Goodness, no. I don't think we would've made it through those first few months with Sam if Mom hadn't been around."

Erica nods. She's glad. She liked Miss McCall. She was always nice to Erica when she was in the hospital because of her seizures and when they had to draw blood Miss McCall always gave Erica the Batman band-aids.

"So who's Sam named after?" Erica asks. Scott's grin widens and Lydia flushes to the tips of her ears. It's a little cute. Just a little.

"Well," Scott starts, laughter coloring his voice. "We couldn't decide on a first name but we knew we wanted Isaac as a second name, so Derek thought it'd be fitting to let Lydia choose."

"And you chose Sam?" Erica doesn't really understand what's so funny about that.

"But ask who she named him Sam after," Scott grins.

"Who?"

"Sam from Lord of the Rings," Lydia grits out and Scott bursts into laughter.

"You named your kid Samwise?"

"No," Scott manages between giggles, "we named him Samuel, but the sentiment's still there."

"Okay, you know what," Lydia turns around to him, blushing even deeper. "Sam is a great character, loyal and hardworking and a great friend to Frodo. But why am I even talking? We have this discussion every time."

"You're right," Scott says. He seems to have mostly recovered from his fit. "We shouldn't have let such a huge nerd name our child, probably."

"You kinda brought it on yourself," Erica agrees.

"Ugh," Lydia huffs and gets up. "I'm gonna go somewhere people appreciate me." She flips her hair dramatically and walks off.

"Bye, Lydia," Scott calls after her, still laughing.

For a moment they watch the proceedings of the yard in silence. There are a lot of people Erica doesn't recognize.

"Who's that over there?"she asks, pointing at a woman with dark hair and a weird aura.

"That's Kira," Scott says, following her finger. "She's a kitsune."

"A kitsune? Guess a lot of shit went down after we left, huh?"

"You could say that, yeah," Scott grimaces.

"We heard news once of some kind of, sacrificial tree in California. Was that here?"

"The Nemeton, yeah that was us, but before that there was actually the alpha pack and then the druid and– it's really complicated."

"Okay," Erica can see how weary Scott looks at the prospect of retelling all their near death experiences. She changes the topic. "So let's talk about you. What do you do nowadays?"

"I took over the animal clinic from Deaton. He finally retired for good," Scott says, clearly much happier about this new line of questioning.

"So you're a doctor, Lydia's a professor–"

"And you're a supernatural foster mom. From what Boyd told me you're doing a lot of good in the community."

"Yeah," Erica smiles. "Plus, I love what I do and the kids are amazing."

"But you don't want any of your own?"

Erica hums. "Maybe someday, but I haven't found the right partner yet."

"So you and Boyd..."

"Nah, he's my best friend and, well, I'm a lesbian."

"So," she goes on after a moment, "I heard you tell your kids stories about me and Boyd?"

"Yeah," Scott grins, rubbing his neck. "All of our friends, really, but the girls especially got kind of hung up on you."

Erica laughs because if she doesn't she might cry. She was no kind of role model back in the times Scott probably tells stories of, she's not even sure if she's a great role model now.

"Yeah, Lydia told me about that 'What would Erica do' thing. You obviously didn't tell them about most the things I did." She means for it to come out as a joke, but it sounds much too bitter for that.

"Hey," Scott says, putting a hand over hers. "We all did bad things back then. Hurtful and ill-advised, but we were also just teenagers, thrown into a situation that was far too big for us."

"You always seemed to handle yourself pretty well."

"Oh, believe me," Scott's mouth twists into a complicated shape, "I had my fair share of fuck ups. Did you know that one time Derek was abducted and turned into a teenager?"

"What?" Erica laughs, "No way, now you're just shitting me."

"No, for real," Scott grins. "It was really freaky. Oh," he seems to realize suddenly. "Also you probably don't know, but I'm the alpha now." He doesn't say it as a show of power or a warning or whatever the hell else, he says it like someone would say, 'oh, by the way, we're out of hot sauce.'

"What about–" Erica frowns, gesturing towards Derek.

"He, okay so Cora, Derek's sister–"

"Wasn't she dead?"

"No, that's Laura. Yeah, I know," Scott grins when Erica makes a face. "But Cora is his younger sister and she survived the fire, except I guess Derek didn't know until she turned up one day, but that's a different story. So Cora got wounded and Derek used his Alpha power to save her, except it drained his power so he wasn't an alpha anymore. And, no, please don't ask me how that works."

"So how did you become the alpha?"

"Oh, um," Scott rubs his neck. "Have you ever heard of a True Alpha?"

Somehow Erica's not surprised. "Damn, we really missed a lot, huh?"

"Yeah, I guess," Scott says with a twist of his head. "Luckily it's cooled down a lot in the last ten years."

They sit in silence for a moment, only broken when Laura, Mel and another girl come running up to them from the left.

"Papa-"

"Uncle Scott," the third girl chimes, "will you watch our theatre?"

"Please," all three say together.

Scott looks over at Erica, a small smile on his face.

"Duty calls," he says with a small shrug.

"Go on then," Erica grins. "Go get 'em, Scotty!"

Scott takes off at a run, the girls fleeing out before him like birds. Erica is only alone for a moment, though, looking out at the clusters of chairs strewn all over the yard, before someone comes up behind her. It's Derek, one hand lightly holding the back of the empty chair.

"Can I sit?" he asks, almost absurdly timid when Erica knows him from a time when every word was an order, perhaps because he'd been too afraid they wouldn't disobey if they were not even more afraid than him.

"Yeah," she smiles and means it.

"How's the meat?" Derek asks, gesturing at the plate. He's not gotten any better at small talk, worse possibly, now that he's actually trying to be friendly. Erica hasn't actually tried it yet so she takes one of the little spears and pops a square of meat in her mouth.

"It's good," she mumbles, mouth still half full. She swallows. "It's good," she says again.

"The seasoning's a family recipe," Derek smiles, the one that shows of his bunny teeth. "I actually," he sobers. "I actually wanted to talk to you. You and Boyd both, but I already talked with him," he gestures to where Erica can see Boyd, sitting on the grass with Scott and Isaac. The girls seem to be in the middle of performing their.

"Lydia already said," Erica admits.

"Yeah?"

"Well, mostly she said that you'd want to tell me yourself. She said you wanted to apologize," her voice climbs higher at the end, almost making it a question. She's not scared of Derek, it's not that, she knows he's not a monster and he never was. He might've done monstrous things but he was just as hard pressed by shit luck circumstances as the rest of them had been, too young to carry the load that he'd suddenly had to bear. Even though he'd seemed so old to her back then, looking back now he'd been scarcely more of a child than them.

"Yes, I do." He's looking at her, turned towards her in the chair, even though he could take the easy way out, look across the yard instead of meeting her eyes. But he does. "I have a lot of things to apologize for, starting with the way I coerced you into taking the bite. I was a huge hypocrite, preaching to Scott about how the bite was a gift, turning around and tricking you into taking it."

"But I said yes."

"Only because I didn't explain the risks to you properly. You might not have taken it if I had, if I'd given you a week to think your decision over. I didn't really give you a choice, I just needed you to say yes so I could clear my conscience, so I could justify the fucked up shit I was doing to all of you. And I apologize for that. I regret it. I wrecked your life to satisfy my need and I can't undo that, ever, but I at least want to say I'm sorry."

"You were in a bad place," Erica says, glancing away from Derek's face. The depth of emotion is making her slightly queasy.

"That's no justification for what I did, not for turning you and not for any of the shit I did after that. I lived in a train car, for God's sake," he laughs slightly shaky, "I wasn't fit to be anyone's teacher or role model, let alone alpha. I had my fucked up, self flagellating coping mechanisms to punish myself, and then I taught them to you and it doesn't matter that at the time it was the only way I knew how to have control, through pain, it doesn't matter that it was my status quo, I taught it to you and that was irresponsible and unacceptable. If I would see an alpha like that now I would immediately intervene. I wasn't fit to lead a pack and I think on some level I knew that and I was taking it out on you. Every time I punished you for not being good enough I was really punishing myself, but it should never have come that far. And I apologize. And I apologize for all the other shit in between, ordering you to hurt people, trying to make you kill Lydia, god, how fucked up. I'm sorry for all of it, but most of all I'm sorry that I gave you and Boyd no other choice but to run away. I want you to know that I don't blame you at all. I gave you no other choice and you did what every good wolf would've done, you listened to your survival instinct. The way I was behaving you couldn't have talked to me and I hate that I was ever that kind of alpha. I'm sorry, Erica."

It's everything Erica needed to hear, all in this big wall of words and emotions. Her throat feels tight, like storm clouds gathering in her larynx. She reaches out to pull Derek into a hug awkwardly, half standing out of her chair, the table between them digging into her hip. She just slings her arms around his neck and squeezes tight.

"Thank you," she croaks. Derek rubs comforting circles into her back and all Erica can do is hold on as her tears come, sobs shaking her body.

Derek maneuvers them around so they're at least standing on the same side of the table and Erica buries her face in his shirt and takes the comfort she never could when he was her alpha but which she so desperately needed in those cold, damp months. She doesn't know how long they stay like that, clinging to each other, like sea clings to cliffs.

When they break apart Erica wipes at her eyes carefully and Derek blinks hard, an uncertain smile on his face.

"Thank you," Erica says again. She touches the fabric of his shirt where her tears have left dark stains. "Sorry I cried on you," she smiles.

"Don't worry," Derek chuckles. "Thank you for listening to what I had to say."

The evening is winding down around them. Someone's turned on the fairy lights draped across the clearing and in the gentle light people are folding up the tables and chairs, carrying piles of plates and cutlery. Lydia and the woman called Kira are herding a group of tired kids towards the house.

"I think someone's looking for you," Derek points towards where Boyd is standing, folded chairs in one hand, scanning the yard for her.

"I'd better go before he gets that lost puppy look," Erica grins.

"Hey," Derek stops her with a hand on her arm. "Stay in touch?"

"Yeah," Erica smiles, covering his hand with hers. "We will."

She saunters over to Boyd, hooking her arm through his.

"Heya," she grins, "ready to go?"

"Yeah, and you? You talk to Derek?" He looks back in the direction she came from where Derek is collecting paper cups in a trash bag.

"Yeah, it was good."

"Yeah."

They're walking towards the car when there are footsteps behind then, Lydia jogging towards them when they turn around.

"Erica, I was hoping I would catch you before you leave," she smiles.

"I'll be in the car," Boyd says to her and Erica nods.

But Lydia doesn't say anything, just stands for a moment, looking at her, eyes dark and intent.

"You know," Lydia smiles, slow and considering. "You look a lot different than you did in high school. You look like you're comfortable." She pauses. "You look like yourself," Lydia smiles as if she has any stakes in Erica feeling good about herself. "It's just good to see, I guess. You had a lot of potential in high school, but high school can be debilitating to potential, so I'm just glad you grew out of it."

"Yeah," Erica grins, thinking of corsets and leopard print, possibly corsets  _ with _ leopard print. She grimaces. "I'm glad you did too. Making yourself small really didn't suit you."

"If that's a height joke I swear I'm leaving," Lydia says with narrowed eyes but the grin at the corner of her mouth gives her away.

"It's not." Erica raises both hands in surrender. "Just saying that you did a lot if acting back then, and you weren't as fun as the theater kids."

"But certainly just as much drama," Lydia shoots back and Erica laughs out loud.

Lydia is watching her, that same something in her eyes as before. She licks her lips. "So you like what you see now?" The question is daring and heated, so very Lydia. It dawns on Erica what that something is she's been seeing. Lydia is flirting with her.

It feels like she's all the way back in high school, awkward and insecure and the prettiest girl in the school is giving her attention, looking at her with that piercing gaze. Except she's not awkward or insecure anymore and two can play at this game.

"I admired you back then, but I also hated you," Erica admits. "I don't hate you now."

"I don't hate you either," Lydia's voice is electric. Wen Erica licks her lips Lydia's eyes track the movement, her pupils dark.

"So, I'll be in Montana soon on a lecture, do you think we could grab a coffee together?"

"Oh," Erica laughs, "you can grab much more than just my coffee."

"It's a date," Lydia grins and holds her hand out. When Erica takes it Lydia uses it to haul her in for a hug, a tight squeeze of warmth and rose shampoo and then she's drawing back again.

She walks backwards towards the house, the open door a square of light in the dusk, wiggling her fingers at Erica.

"I'll see you soon," Lydia calls out. In the darkness Erica can just make out the curve of her smile.

"I'll be waiting," she calls back. Lydia stands for a second, silhouetted in the door frame, warmth and laughter pouring out around her. Erica waves one last time and the she turns towards the car where Boyd is waiting for her.

This house is a home again, but it's not hers. She's got her own home to get back to, full of noise and life and love. They're waiting for her now.

She goes.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on tumblr at [twlesbians](http://twlesbians.tumblr.com/)


End file.
